"Barry B. Longyear - Homecoming" - читать интересную книгу автора (Longyear Barry)

Lothas looked around at the empty control center. Moments after he
gave the initiate-desuspension command, the center would be a hive of
activityтАж a hive of activity; I wonder if the little stinging sweetsects have
survived? He looked at the banks of receiving equipment, sensor and
analysis piles, and the rest of the tools that the knowing ones would use to
see how Nitola had changed.

But, this moment there is still quietтАФthis wondrous, jeweled loneliness
of space. I ache for my home planet, but this, too, has become my home.

He reached out a claw and closed the shield, cutting off his view of the
homestar. As the center returned to yellow light, Lothas pressed the
initiate-desuspension command. As the ships answered, he listened to the
sounds of life stirring in his own vessel тАФ motors whined, draining the
clear suspension from countless lengths of veins and replacing it with
warm blood.

Lothas looked at the drain set into the skin of his own arm. He pulled it
free and watched as the blood pooled slightly, then began clotting. He
tossed the drain into a recycler. We will need them no longer. We are
almost home.


Carl Baxter, garbed in regulation briefs and tee shirt, looked up from
under the bed. "Where are my socks?"

The lump on the bed, sheets pulled up over her head, mumbled. "I don't
wear 'em."
 "It's my last pair of clean socks. Now, where are they?"

The lump pulled the sheets down, exposing a sleep-mussed tousle of
black curls framing a pretty angry, face. "You'd have clean socks if you'd
do the laundry more often. We both work. There's no reason why I have to
be the тАФ "

"Yeah, yeah, yeah." Baxter pulled out the dresser and looked behind it.

"Yeah, yeah, is it?"

"Yeah." He pushed the dresser back against the wall. "Look, it's not like
we had the same kind of job, Deb. I have to be at the base at oh-six-thirty
six days a week and sometimes seven. I'm lucky if I can drag it home in
time for Johnny Carson. And, you want me to pitch in with the laundry,
grocery shopping, housecleaningтАФ"

"Look, supersoldier!" Deb pushed, her hair from her eyes. "You think
keeping the agency going by myself is easy? Just last week that idiot layout
man you hired before you were called up totally feebed the Boxman Spring
campaign. I've been putting in sixteen hour days to try and have ready in
time! You want laundry on top of that?"